The fiscal reform on business income, recently approved by the Italian authorities, has deeply modified the whole system of taxation. Two new taxes: IRAP, the regional taxation on business activities, and the Dual Incom Tax have been introduced. The paper assesses the achievments of the reform estimating the amount of taxes due according to the old and new rules. The empirical appraisal of the reform has been carried out through a micro-simulationmodel based on the financial statement of 27 thousand Italian manufacturing firms. The results confirm that the new system lower the burden of overall business taxation. This reduction is distributed homogeneously throughout the industrial sectors but varies according to the capital structure of the firms with businesses with a low level of debt gaining more then others from the reform.

Giovanna Gavana, Antonio Majocchi, Anna Marenzi, in "ECONOMIA PUBBLICA " 2/2001, pp. , DOI: